by Parker, Ali
He took my hand and held it tightly, and the way he was looking at me, I started to believe that maybe I hadn’t actually fucked this up as badly as I’d let myself believe I had. Maybe I didn’t have as much to fear as I thought.
“Winnie said that we should order pizza in tonight,” he said as he led me through to the kitchen. “And I said that I wanted to cook something, but then I remembered that I’ve already inflicted my only dish on to you, so we went for the pizza instead.”
“You saved me there, Winnie,” I told the little girl with a wink. She had hopped up on to the kitchen counter, and Tink was running around under her feet. She winked back at me, a little moment for just the two of us to share.
“Hey, I hope you two haven’t started conspiring against me,” Harry joked.
I shook my head at once. “We would never do a thing like that, would we, Winnie?” I replied.
Winnie shook her head as well. “Never,” she echoed, and the two of us giggled.
I could almost fool myself that the enormous revelation that had piled down on top of us over the last week hadn’t even happened. Everything felt so normal. It was easy to kid myself that it was.
We got out plates and set out glasses, and Harry answered the door when the pizza arrived and came in carrying a stack of boxes.
“How much did you get?” I exclaimed. “You know it’s just the three of us, right?”
“And Tink,” Winnie piped in.
“I don’t think Tink should be eating anything other than dog food after the nonsense he pulled with your socks, right?” I reminded Winnie, but Tink was already hopping excitedly up on his hind legs, trying to get a look at the food.
Avoiding him as best he could, Harry served us up our food. He had a smile on his face as he did it, but I could see a tinge of sadness there, too. Or maybe he was just exhausted. I couldn’t imagine all he’d had to do over the last week since the news had come in. I wished I could come out and ask him, but I had no idea how much Winnie knew, and I didn’t want to put my foot in it when I had barely been here twenty minutes.
We sat down around the table, still tripping over an enthusiastic Tink, and Winnie chatted to me about my work that day. Then she told me she had read the book I’d given her and thanked me for it, too. She was such a sweet girl, and it made me so happy to hear that I had picked out the right gift for her. I knew that if I let myself, it would be all too easy to spoil her. She just had such a curiosity for the world around her, and it was in my nature to want to indulge it.
Harry smiled as he watched us talk, and he held my hand under the table. He had to be thinking the same thing as me—that this sweet domesticity couldn’t last, no matter how much we might have wanted it to.
I longed to keep things as they had always been, but I wasn’t sure we could. Not any longer. Too much had changed. Too much was new. He had a son to think about now—or at least, he did as far as I was concerned. So what did that mean for us? What now? What next?
And how long was I going to have to wait to find out the answers to those questions?
Chapter 51
Harry
As soon as I’d heard her voice on the message, I’d known that she was hurting as much as I was.
I had managed to restrain my anger over all of this well enough until that moment. I knew there was no point in getting angry, but that wasn’t going to stop me, not when it felt like there was so damn much on the line and so little control given to me over the lot of it.
I was just angry that I felt like all of this was spinning out of control again, when it had just started to fall into place for a change.
I had been nervous about seeing Raina. In fact, I was worried that she wasn’t going to want anything to do with me ever again. I already came with a lot of baggage, and this was just another stack of suitcases to add to the pile I was already heaving around everywhere I went.
It wouldn’t have surprised me if she had just thrown her hands up in the air and backed off, leaving me to cope with all of this by myself. I would have felt a little cheated, sure, but this wasn’t what she had signed up for. This was nowhere close, and it wasn’t fair to just take it as a given that she would stay when the rules of the game had changed while we were in the middle of playing it.
But I loved her, and I knew I had to see her again. I couldn’t just be done with everything like that. She deserved better. We both did. We both deserved to decide exactly how we were going to move forward with this, and we deserved to do it together.
By the time we had finished dinner and washed up, it was getting close to Winnie’s bedtime, and I bribed her into heading up a little early by promising that Tink could sleep in her room for the night. She said goodbye to Raina, gave me a kiss, and then headed up the stairs. I watched her walk away, and I felt a pang of sadness come over me all at once. It was these moments, the simple ones, that I was going to struggle with missing the most. I couldn’t bear the thought of not being able to just spend all the time I wanted with my niece or with Raina.
I turned to Raina, and I found her looking up at me with some nervousness in her eyes. I gestured for her to take a seat in the living room, and she followed me through, the two of us sinking into the couch. I took her hand and looked down at her soft fingers next to my own.
God, she was so perfect that sometimes it made something in me hurt, as though my body was trying to understand how a single person could hold so many of the things that I wanted and needed right there in her hands. She didn’t even look like she was aware of it, not sitting there opposite me, not right now.
Her eyes scanned mine as she waited for me to come out and say something. I didn’t know where to start. All of this was still so fresh in my own head that putting it into words for someone else felt like it might have been nigh on impossible.
“So, I met with the woman,” I told her. “The woman who got in contact with George. And I met her son, Nico.”
“And?” she asked, her eyes wide as she waited for me to go on.
I struggled to keep going. I didn’t know if what I was going to tell her next was going to scare her off, and I was so frightened that I was on the brink of losing her that I could hardly cope with going forward. What if she thought I was being crazy? What if she just checked out, done with me?
But as I looked into her curious, caring eyes, I knew that she would never have done that to me. She loved me too much. I knew that she couldn’t fake the affection that she had for me, the connection that we shared with one another. I might have believed that before, but it was different now. I knew that it was her, all her, only her, and that it had been all this time and that it would be, long into my future. I couldn’t go on without telling her the truth.
“They wanted to take a DNA test, and I submitted to one, but I took one look at him, and I just... I just knew,” I said. “He’s my son, Raina. I’m sure of it. I don’t see why Allison—that’s his mom—I don’t see why she would have bothered with any of this if she knew we could catch her out so easily in a lie.”
“How long till the test results come back?” she asked quietly.
“A few days, at most,” I replied. “It’s not going to be long. I can tell you that. But like I said, I don’t have any reason to doubt this woman, not really. She’s being honest with me. I’m certain of it. If you took one look at this little boy, you would get that, too…”
I trailed off as I thought about them. It hurt, knowing that I had been out of his life for so long, but I had to take relief in the fact that I was in it now. I had so much to learn about Nico, so much to understand about the way he moved through the world.
Though I had been there for Winnie’s infancy, I had raised her only from about eight years old and up, so being around a child that young would pose all kinds of challenges that I hadn’t had to take on before.
“I hope I get to meet him,” she told me softly.
I squeezed her hand tightly. “That’s the thing,” I replied. “It’s why...
well, there’s a reason his mother brought him into my life after all this time.”
“And I guess, from the look on your face, that it’s not good news?”
“It’s not,” I admitted. “She’s... sick. Cancer.”
Raina gasped and covered her mouth with her hand. “Oh my God, I’m so sorry,” she breathed.
I shook my head. “She was struggling to keep up with the payment for her treatment, as well as treatment for an immune system thing that he has. That’s why she reached out to me. She needs the support. Financial, I think more than anything, but there’s also the fear that if she...”
I trailed off and forced myself to take a deep breath. Though the circumstances couldn’t have been more different, this was stirring up some sad memories of what had happened to my sister.
“If she didn’t make it,” I continued, forcing myself to keep speaking, “then she would need someone to be there to take care of him for her.”
Raina nodded slowly, taking it all in. I couldn’t imagine how much this all was for her. Hell, it was still a lot for me, and I was just starting to put the pieces together again inside my own head after spending days wandering around all listless with no clue what I was going to do with my life now that this revelation had come and kicked my door in.
“So you might have to make room for a toddler?” she asked quietly.
I nodded. “I’m trying not to let my mind go there, but you can never tell how these things are going to go. She says it’s early stages yet and that the treatment options look pretty good for her, but I think it’s always worthwhile to plan for what might happen.”
“Oh my God, that poor woman,” Raina murmured, and her eyes clouded over with a sudden rush of tears.
I was touched. She already cared so much about them, about Allison, even though she had never met her. I doubted that a lot of women would have been too delighted at the thought of a one-night stand coming back into their boyfriend’s life, but she was so sure and secure in what we had that nothing of that nature seemed to so much as cross her mind.
“And I know it’s a lot to ask for you to get involved in,” I told her. “I get that. I do, really. I don’t want you to think that you don’t have any choice here because you do and you always will.”
“I know that I do,” she assured me. “I know you would never ask me to do anything I didn’t want to.”
She sat there for a moment, her eyes still soft with tears, and I felt awful for having pulled her into all of this. But how could I have known? And even if I had, would that have been enough to keep me from her? I doubted it.
Her presence near me was such a profound and important thing, I couldn’t imagine turning it over for anything. Even if it would have been better for me not to have to worry about her at a time like this, not to have to fear about losing someone else that I loved, I couldn’t give up what we had already. She was too important to me.
“Raina?” I asked her softly, and she looked up at me. Though the tears were still in her eyes, there was a sureness to her that I recognized at once. She had this attitude when she knew that she was set on a path of her choice. Nothing was going to sway her. It was the same look she’d had when I’d first told her that I wanted her to help us find a dog, and I had known at once that she wasn’t going to let us leave without one.
“What can I do?” she asked simply. The easiness of the question caught me off guard a little. It had been a long time since someone had asked me something as straightforward as that. Usually, I was the one offering to help any way that I could. But hearing her say that was almost cathartic.
I opened my mouth before I had even formed the words in my brain, before I knew what I was going to say. I just had a feeling that I had to express to her before I could stop myself in my tracks.
“Just be here for me,” I asked her. “I’ve had to do this once before, and I was all alone then, and I don’t think I can handle it by myself again.”
She slid across the couch and into my lap, winding her arms tightly around me and holding me close. I closed my eyes and buried my face in her neck, inhaling her scent, thanking God that she was still here after everything I had told her.
“You won’t have to do it alone again,” she murmured in my ear. “I promise. I’m going to be here this time, no matter what.”
I didn’t know what to say to that. I was overwhelmed with love for her. And a little mad at myself for ever doubting for a single moment that she would be here for me when I needed her to be. She loved me, and I loved her, and we were committed to something precious and perfect between us.
Nothing was going to pull us apart. The universe might have thrown something huge in our direction, but we were going to stare it down and take it on, and that was the only thing that mattered to me right now. Doing it together.
Never having to fear about doing it alone again.
Chapter 52
Raina
“Lizzie left me.”
My jaw almost dropped when I heard Reed tell me exactly why he had such a miserable look on his face. I had been so happy when I’d gotten there that it had taken me a while to realize that my twin looked seriously maudlin. Although when I’d asked him to spill, this was the last thing I’d expected.
“Lizzie left you?” I asked, sure that I must have heard at least some of it wrong.
He nodded and fiddled with the spoon next to his coffee cup. He had hardly touched his drink, but it looked like he could have used it. There were dark circles under his eyes, and it was obvious that he had been up all night.
“She said that she didn’t think we were going to be a good match at the end of the day,” he explained, and his voice was so small and so written with hurt that I felt a rising wave of anger rush through me. Sure, I had never been Lizzie’s biggest fan, but that didn’t mean that she got to just hurt my brother like that.
“Well, her loss,” I told him firmly, and I got up from my seat and gave him a huge hug. He just stayed there, all limp in my arms, and I knew that he was in some real, serious pain.
“It’s going to be all right,” I tried to convince him, but I knew that he wouldn’t believe it coming from me. After all, I had only just gotten into an actual relationship of my own. I was hardly an expert.
“I just can’t believe it,” he muttered. “I thought that was it, you know? But then, she leaves her ring on the bedside table and that’s it.”
“She hasn’t even cleared her stuff out of the apartment yet?”
He shook his head.
“Well, we can’t have that,” I told him with certainty. “We need to get that in hand before anything else can happen. I don’t want you sitting there amongst all her stuff if I can help it. I’ll come around tonight, and we can clear everything out, okay?”
“Okay,” he replied, and I got the feeling he would have gone along with anything that I had suggested in that moment. He seemed utterly sapped of energy, but I supposed that was what being up all night, tossing and turning about your asshole of an ex-fiancée, would do to you.
“I’ll come around after work,” I promised him. “You just get through the day, all right? We’re going to handle this, Reed. I promise.”
And with that, I sent him on his way and headed down to the clinic. I couldn’t believe that this had really happened. I was sure that they were the perfect couple. Sure, she might not have been my first choice for a sister-in-law, but Reed had been crazy about her, and anyone who went near the two of them could see that.
But somehow, she had grown tired of it. Maybe she had met someone else? The thought made my anger flare up again, but I knew it was just protectiveness of my brother. There was no reason for me to hold it against her. She had made her choice, and she was going to have to go ahead and live with that choice, even after she figured out that she was never going to find anyone who came close to being as good as Reed.
Of course, I did toss around a few fun ideas of how I could ruin her life if I got the chance. Maybe
go to her apartment, pretend to be her long-lost sister, and make up a bunch of nonsense about what she had been like when she was a kid? Or accuse her of cheating on Reed?
There was plenty I could have done, but in truth, not much of it held much interest for me. She had lost out on Reed, who was—and I knew I was biased here but still—one of the best men on the planet. Once she figured that out, she wouldn’t need me to come by and ruin her life because she would already have taken care of that herself.
I texted Harry to cancel on our plans for the evening. I didn’t want him to think that I was getting cold feet or anything, but I had to take care of Reed. He needed me right now, and Harry would surely be able to understand that.
Yes, it was frustrating, given that we had just gotten over the little blip that had come with my running out on him after he had found out about his son, but he would understand. If there was anyone who understood that family was the most important thing, it was Harry, after all.
He texted back at once, telling me to take all the time I needed and wishing me luck in dealing with my down-and-out brother. I smiled and sent him back a line of kisses. He was so damn sweet. I was going to miss seeing him tonight, but it wasn’t like I had much of a choice. It was all systems go on operation make-Reed-feel-better, and that meant clearing out any trace of Lizzie from his apartment and maybe getting a little drunk with him, too.
I explained to Rita what had happened, and she clasped a hand to her chest in shock.
“I thought they were, like, the perfect couple?” she remarked.
I shrugged. “Seems like it might have just been an act they were putting on.”
